Night Train to Jamalpur(53)

‘I’ve heard of it in native vendettas. Snakes put in people’s houses.’

‘Never on trains before?’

‘Of course not.’

I said, ‘We don’t know exactly where in the compartments the snakes have been placed. I mean they must have been of sight, otherwise the victims wouldn’t have entered the compartments in the first place.’

Hedley Fleming said, ‘The logical place would be under the seats, wouldn’t it? There’s usually enough space there, from what I can recall.’

‘Why would that be logical?’

‘Snakes live in holes in the ground. They feel safer in a dark, restricted space.’

‘Would they prefer to be in a restricted space with hard edges, or in a cloth bag or a rolled-up coat or dhoti?’

‘In a restricted space with hard edges.’

‘Even a restricted space where one side is open, like the underneath of a railway seat?’

‘Yes.’

‘And when you say “happy”, what do you mean?’

‘I mean the snake would stay there for a while.’

‘Long enough to let a passenger come in and sit down?’

‘Yes.’

‘So a snake is quite happy in a snake charmer’s basket?’

‘Quite happy. Tell me, what was the latest death?’

‘There were two on Monday. A sawscale viper killed an American tourist at Bally, and a common krait killed a retired colonel at Khana Junction. Is there any real difference in the effects of those two snakes?’

‘The viper causes a very protracted and unpleasant death, which should appeal to the sadist.’

‘What happens?’

‘Extreme anaphylactic reaction.’

‘Go on.’

‘Within twenty minutes you’d be bleeding from every orifice. After a couple of days you’d have turned yellow and your organs would be shutting down.’

‘If you were bitten on the arm, say, and you applied a tourniquet immediately, could that save you?’

Hedley Fleming looked at his watch again. He evidently didn’t think much of the tourniquet idea, because he didn’t even mention it. ‘If you severed the arm immediately, you might have a chance.’

‘And if you didn’t?’

‘Look, you’re going to die anyway. If you mean what would happen to the arm, it would be three times its normal size after a few minutes.’

‘And as for the krait . . .’

‘The krait, like the cobra, is an elapid. It’s a faster death, but still more unpleasant.’

‘How?’

‘The central nervous system shuts down completely after about ten minutes so you’re fighting to breathe, but you’re paralysed.’

‘And on one occasion the king cobra was used.’

‘For theatrical effect, no doubt.’ Professor Fleming leant forward and for the first time there was a trace of animation about him. ‘The king cobra is a most remarkable beast, Captain Stringer.’

‘Why?’

‘It’s . . . enigmatic.’

‘All snakes are enigmatic aren’t they?’

‘The king is a cut above, capable almost of a degree of . . . magnanimity.’

‘He wasn’t very magnanimous to Miss Schofield of Leamington Spa.’

‘But she wasn’t bitten, was she?’ That was true, and it seemed Hedley had been following the cases in some detail, after all. ‘A king has been known to merely . . . strike a man with his head, to give a kind of punch.’

‘As a warning.’

‘Exactly.’

I was revolving the idea of telling him about my own encounter with a king cobra, when Fleming said, ‘I’m afraid I have a social engagement this evening, and I really must prepare for it.’

As we both rose, I said, ‘What is the appeal of snakes? Is it a sort of morbid fascination?’

‘No, Captain Stringer, it is not. About twenty-five thousand people a year die of snake bites in India, the majority in the central provinces of Bengal. There is at present no effective anti-venom of any kind. It is in the hope of assisting in the search for one that I came to this city.’

So that was me told.

Coming out of the Zoological Gardens, and signalling without success for a tonga, I headed north for a minute, before crossing the ornamental bridge that seemed embarrassed to traverse the sunken green water of the crumbling canal called Tolly’s Nullah; then I walked past the Telegraph Stores, and the Police Training School, coming to the junction with Lower Circular Road, where I contemplated the square mile of burnt grass that made up the race course and polo ground.

A motor car came up to the junction with all its widows down and I looked inside. The driver was Indian. In the rear seat sat Hedley Fleming in a white dinner jacket, and this set up a clash between his clever schoolboy aspect and the world of adult party-going, so that Fleming seemed caught halfway between scientist and socialite. I believed he saw me as the car paused, but either way, it drove on, turning left on to Lower Circular Road and making a spiral of dust in its wake.